Cops On Campus

Yes, They're Trained And Yes, They Can Arrest You

November 26, 1995|By Mark Shuman. Special to the Tribune.

On a recent afternoon at Harper College in Palatine, public safety officer Phillip Robert activated his flashing lights and pulled over an athlete whose vehicle had rolled through a stop sign on campus.

It was a routine traffic stop, but the student reacted incredulously, repeating the words, "You can't do this to me," Robert recalls.

When the young man refused to answer questions, citing advice from a coach who claimed campus security personnel like Robert weren't "real" cops and lacked the power of arrest, Robert tried to explain. But the student persisted and eventually found himself riding in a squad car to the Rolling Meadows Police Department.

"You can't do this to me" were the student's last words when the Rolling Meadows officer shut the door on the lockup.

"I just did," was the officer's reply.

Capable, mild-mannered and approachable, Robert says the incident was unusual, and quickly added that under normal circumstances the student probably would have walked away with a warning. In this case, however, the athlete's refusal to answer questions eventually led to his arrest.

However atypical, the story brings attention to the public's sometimes confused notions about the role and powers entrusted to campus police and security officers.

"It's the people who think they don't have to listen who are usually the ones who are most shocked to find themselves with a court date," he says.

Although the powers of security officers at area junior college campuses do vary, at Harper officers are fully trained police and are licensed as such, supervisor Kevin King says. Although the officers do not carry weapons, they would be qualified to do so if it were deemed necessary by college administrators--and they can make arrests.

King has a staff of 23, including seven sworn officers (who must be 21, have had weapons training and be a graduate of a certified police academy) and 16 security officers and clerical staff. Three to five people are on patrol during daytime and evening shifts, and two of those are sworn officers, Overnight, there is one sworn officer and one security person on duty.

At Elgin Community College, Richard Cervantes, director of campus safety, oversees a staff of four sworn officers and seven security officers. At least one sworn officer is on duty at all times, plus two to three security officers, he says.

And at Oakton Community College in Des Plaines, there are eight sworn officers and five cadets and security guards employed.

As at other two-year colleges in the northwest suburbs, Harper's crime rates have been very low in recent years. The most serious incident at any of the schools occurred in 1979, when a 22-year-old Harper student from Riverside was charged with stabbing two fellow students, killing one and seriously injuring the other.

"That one was solved in about 20 minutes," King says, after Dean A. Johnson was arrested in a cemetery about a mile from the campus. King says the Harper department, Palatine police, Cook County Sheriff's deputies and Illinois State Police were in on the arrest.

Last January, King's department also investigated the reported rape of a student that allegedly occurred outside the Harper library. Although the victim's mother contacted authorities, she declined to let her daughter come in. Without a victim, the investigation stalled, King and Palatine police say.

Employed at Harper's public safety department for 18 years, King of Streamwood considers himself lucky that his school's crime rate has remained so low for so long, but also attributes his success to solid training procedures, hiring practices and vigilant patrols. Although King's department retains police jurisdiction on campus, in higher-profile cases such as the 1979 murder and the recent alleged rape, the Palatine police are quickly called in to help.

Deputy Chief Jack McGregor of the Palatine Police Department says that although the college is a municipal corporation with its own police force, "if a major crime occurs there, we have an agreement to work with them," given his department's greater resources, including evidence technicians.

McGregor has a solid working relationship with King because the two worked together at Harper while McGregor was studying toward his first degree in law enforcement and learning the ropes as a young officer on the campus in the late 1960s, he says.

"Many young aspiring police officers use the campuses as stepping stones," says McGregor. "Policing a campus is a unique experience."

Chief Robert Sturlini of the Des Plaines Police Department was also a classmate of McGregor's at Harper.

Other area college police departments report good working relationships with their municipal police counterparts.